recovery & other sketches: post-finale trio
by worshippingbones
Summary: Summer dress. High heels. Summer dress and no shoes at all. Summer dress slid off the hips and onto the floor, replaced by shorts. Then different shorts. Then those were on the floor and she danced into a skirt and flats. "So over outfits," she announced.
1. Chapter 1

Summer dress. High heels. Summer dress and no shoes at all. Summer dress slid off the hips and onto the floor, replaced by shorts. Then different shorts. Then those were on the floor and she danced into a skirt and flats.

"So over outfits," she announced, gaily, as Hal halfheartedly watched her dress and undress, throw clothes and trip over herself. "Now that I can, I want to change all the time. I want to change every hour."

He smiled, said nothing, thumbed through the pages of his book. "You're going to miss the sun if you don't settle on something soon."

"Trust me, I know."

He slipped into the words for a moment as she synced with him and fell quiet, trying on several different tops. Next were her rings, which she switched several times – the one with the moon on her pointer or her ring finger? What about the plain silver one? What about the snake? Hal shifted his weight from foot to foot in the doorway and she took the hint. Slim rings slipped down slim digits and she fussed no more. She seemed ready to launch herself out of the room, until she froze and looked at him imploringly.

"What if I just do pants? I don't want this skirt right now. I feel like I should make the most of it, though. Are pants too boring?"

"Pants are fine," Hal stated, eyebrows raising before his eyes did, reluctant to leave the page. "Pants are incredibly normal. Boring."

Time froze under the weight of this implication and her body seemed to bow under the mass. She could be normal. He could be normal. He, she, we, them, us, they could be normal, they could be boring. They could take that liberty. Any day, all day, no day at all, whenever they wanted.

Alex wore jeans out on their walk that day and fussed no more.

• • •

Recovery was their next task. Their lives had been so focused on adapting – now it was all healing, rest, and relaxation. Things had changed in a millisecond, flipping their lives around, but their bodies were still catching up. Tom still kept the backpack he used to take out to the woods every month. Hal cleaned the house daily and kept his domino in his pocket, flipping it expertly between his fingers in times of stress. Alex was still surprised when she had to walk from room to room.

Certain things took on more weight. Hal lingered in front of mirrors, took extra time shaving, and would occasionally stand in the bathroom, stark naked after a shower, towel beside him on the floor, just staring at himself. Alex let him. This was part of the process.

Alex was cheekier now, having gotten away with rent-a-ghosting from room to room and pranking Rook. She would occasionally push people or knock things over, but being totally visible, had no way to explain it but crouching down and laughing for minutes on end when caught. Hal let her. This was part of the process.

When feeling particularly intimate, Hal still went for her throat first. The neck and jawline took on a semi-holy significance and Hal caressed her throat, trailing fingers over her jugular and jawline, taking too long with his lips against her windpipe – no force, just lingering, breathing, loving. There was no urge anymore, and he always tried to push himself, only to find no beast pushing back. He never bit. He would just nuzzle. Alex let him. This was part of the process.

Some days were weird, kaleidoscopic, rough. The nightmare of their curses lingered in the house when they thought about it too much. Memories made it difficult to go outside, and sometimes the trio sat on the couch, saying nothing, staring at a show they mutually hated, not listening. They understood. This was part of the process.

Hal was there the first time Alex dropped to her knees and buried her face in her arms, crouched in the attic, and burst into rib-wracking sobs. He slipped an arm around her trembling back, not bothering her with a 'why' or a 'what's wrong'. He had seen the progression of corrosive memory in her face before her body registered the grief of dying and she dropped. Hal let her. This was part of the process.

• • •


	2. Chapter 2

Ever since the dancing prank, Tom had been sincerely active about dancing. Alex couldn't stand to watch him dance alone, so she'd grab him and get moving. Eventually, she taught him how to swing dance. The two swung each other around the living room, Alex's skirt swirling, short hair flying, her smile just a bright flash as she and Tom moved in relative sync. Hal watched from afar, content, quietly wishing he wasn't too shy to whisk Alex off like that, just for fun. Not shy, reserved. He wished he wasn't too reserved.

Alex would always be the first to slow, stumbling to a stop against Tom, who held her for just a moment while they laughed, heads on each other's shoulders, before congratulating each other on a minimally destructive dancing session. Tom seemed more in control of his body now that the wolf was gone – he was still a clunky guy, with blunt and simple sensibilities, but something tuned in since the wolf was muted. He was a good dancer and Alex appreciated the levity, appreciated the action, the commotion, the broken lamps.

To the rest of the world, it looked like they were celebrating, and they were. They laughed loudly, talked loudly, jostled each other, danced together, sang where people could hear. Their brevity lit up any room. One might've thought they had just won a game or had downed a drink too many.

They were always celebrating their miraculous new leases on life, their new freed bodies, the room they had to goof around and just be. Life settled in around them as it had when they were bound to curses – rent, groceries, cleaning, chores, phone trouble, car trouble – but they had living cells and pumping blood and a normal human lifespan to combat these downers.

Not much upset the residents of Honolulu Heights anymore.

• • •

Tom retained a special connection with nature, despite having cut the cord that tied him to the beast. He was comfortable no matter the weather, rushing around in the snow, shine, or rain, doing errands for the house. A few weeks after they defeated the Devil, he went out and bought himself a pet.

He had more of a nurturing instinct than Hal and Alex combined. They had gone out for a late lunch one day and came home to find Tom on the couch, feet on the coffee table, cradling a young female ferret who was curled up in his arms.

He held her delicately, so delicately, and the couple approached slowly, not wanting to scare the two of them. Alex saw how Tom refused to take his eyes off her, petting her with a large, clumsy hand as gently as he could.

"She's beautiful," he murmured as the ferret stirred, apparently tired out from the big move. "She's been so calm since we got home. I built her a cage before I got her and everything, so she won't be a bother."

Alex settled on the couch beside him, delight rising, as she looked over the tiny, gorgeous white animal in Tom's arms. "She's adorable, Tom. How much was she?"

"Not much," he replied, eyes still locked on his new best friend. "Don't worry. I saved up. I didn't want to see her in that pet store anymore. She's more than a prize to be bought."

Hal clicked his tongue and removed himself from the heartwarming scene to hang up his coat, quietly unhappy to have what he thought to be a rodent in the house.

Alex bit her lip, saving the moment. The look on Tom's face said it all – his heavy brows were low, eyes glazed and settled on his baby, quiet, thoughtful. He was looking at her like she was made of gold, like he had never seen anything so precious, anything that mattered so much.

Alex grinned, unzipped her coat, and tackled the elephant in the room. "What's her name, then?"

"I was thinking-"

A moment where Tom struggled and finally looked over at Alex, suddenly- shy? Unsure? His jaw worked for a moment and his big brown eyes dropped back to his lap.

"I was thinking Eve. Her name's Eve. I think they'd be happy about it, George and Nina."

Alex didn't feel that she had the authority to vouch for either of Tom's old friends, so she crossed her arms, and stayed quiet for a moment.

"You would know best, Tom."

And so her name was Eve.


	3. Chapter 3

• • •

Safe to say, they no longer worked at the café.

With everything that had happened, they decided they wanted nothing to do with the place – every member of the staff was dead, so Tom and Hal quietly stopped showing up. Nobody noticed in the aftermath of Satan's deadly broadcast.

The day after their transformation was perhaps the strangest one of all.

After they got their fill of Antique Roadshow, the trio stayed up practically all night, discussing the ins and outs of their terrifying personal experiences with Captain Hatch. Even Hal was open about the options the devil gave him – talking brought them closer and closer to shaping their new reality, coming to terms with their emotions.

There were few things that the trio hadn't struggled through together, so they all huddled together on the couch with mugs of tea and talked it out. It was friend-therapy – Alex cried a few times and Hal was visibly itching to comfort her. After he told his story, Hal got quiet and sullen, and they gave him time to think.

It had been rough all around.

Alex started to lose her train of thought around 3:30 AM, and Tom had already dozed off, chin dropping against his chest, head periodically bobbing when feverish dreams woke him up.

"You know I'm not much for getting to bed late," Hal stated in a low voice while they watched Tom drift off. "But this was such a monumental night that I don't think I could've gone to bed on time."

"I know," Alex said, voice weak. "I'm exhausted now, but at the same time, I don't want to sleep."

"Why not?" Hal thought he had a feeling about what she was getting at, but wanted her to get it out.

"I feel like I just was sleeping. For ages. I can sleep when I'm... y'know, dead." That was a heavy word. It sounded hideous, like it hurt the mouth, like she had to choke it up and let it live in their living room, polluting the air in which it stood, sounding like too much pain, tasting like too much grief.

"Which you aren't," Hal whispered, reaching over to wrap an arm around her shoulders, fingers just brushing her neck, insinuating possibilities that were overwhelming. Overwhelmingly fun, overwhelmingly temping.

"Which I'm not," she repeated, emotion beginning to well up again. Death, rebirth, the devil, bodies in the streets, the ritual, and now the nightmare was over. Now her life could be friends, family, loss, sensation, joy, sex, food, pain, love. She lowered her eyes, feeling him tease strands of her hair as the clock ticked, out of time with Tom's snores. "I think this is a little too much right now, I'm sorry."

"Too much?" Hal leaned back and withdrew the arm immediately, now unsure of what to do with it. If only he had his domino in hand. Instead, he twisted his immaculately clean hands in his lap, and then crossed his arms. "I'm sorry. You're right. It's late."

There was a scary moment then, while the clock ticked, and while they both thought of perhaps jumping on each other, or what would happen if she slid over into his lap or perhaps just held his hand.

She got up first before her legs willed these thoughts to life.

"I'm gonna go to bed, I guess."

"So am I. I'll follow you up."

It was a Freudian slip that made the hairs on both their necks stand on end and Hal nearly curdle with embarrassment. Alex took a deep breath and pretended she had missed the innuendo, scurrying off to the bedroom she had made her own. Hal ran a hand over his face when she left the room, pausing to look at himself in the mirror before retreating to his- not her- room when her footsteps faded and her door had closed.

He had practically blushed like a teenager at accidentally insinuating the mere idea that they should sleep in the same bed. It was hideous and totally alarming how clumsy he felt without the hunger, without slaughter and blood to ground him and keep him aloof. He had nothing but extra memories and pain over everyone else. No power, no status.

He'd die when he was 90 or so, just like everyone else. And Alex had just made him react like he was 16.

He rode out the wave of high-pitched, hard-to-swallow excitement and skipped his routines, opting for curling up in bed like he hadn't in years.

He went to bed giddy and had horrible dreams. Conflicted dreams. He woke up confused, weak sun filtering between his partially open curtains, making him wonder what time it was.

As usual, it was 7 AM, and he hadn't slept a wink past his normal time. Still routine. Still in control, he reassured himself, dressing quickly in front of the mirror. He was still strong looking. He really hadn't aged. They didn't lie. He hadn't aged in 500 years, from what he could remember.

What a horrific manipulation of the human cycle, to remove aging, he thought bitterly. Not only do you go the rest of your relative life without seeing yourself, but you also get stuck looking so young. At least he had died handsome.

Did Alex think he was handsome? Did he look dated? Would she keep thinking he was handsome?

He felt uncomfortably like a teenager again and refused to think about it, opting to head straight downstairs for breakfast instead.

The chattering from the vents chimed in as he turned the corner to find Tom already making eggs, gaily, with the TV on.

"Mornin', Hal. Up bright n' early," said Tom with an impressed nod. "Getting started on being a person quick. Same here."

Hal smiled and said nothing.

"We can do anything we want now," Tom said, scraping eggs out of the pan and onto a plate. "We can really do anything. Whenever we want."

Hal had no response, suddenly choked up. He took a deep breath and stayed quiet, hoping Tom wouldn't probe.

"I honestly didn't know what to do first," Tom confessed in the wake of Hal's silence. "I figured the best way to start would be to feed Alex, but she's still passed out."

Alex couldn't have been any more passed out, despite the frightening dreams.

She lay in bed twenty minutes after waking up, afraid to move. Was she still asleep? Had yesterday ever happened? Was she still a ghost? Had she died at all? Was she just completely insane?

Tom's voice drifted up the stairs and she smelled food, faintly, and remembered, pouring faith into the validity of their new lives. She had to be alive.

And whatever was down there, she was going to eat it. Maybe all of it. They could make more, and she had months of not being able to eat to make up for here.

She bolted down the stairs in her pajamas and into the kitchen, sliding on her too-long pants and catching the edge of the table to steady herself. She ignored them both and heaped eggs onto her plate, inconsiderate, greedy, human.

Hal kept the grin off his face when she came in. He swallowed the fright and the excitement. He ignored wanting to hug her, to get close to her, to scoop her up into his life.

She ignored everything but the food.

• • •


	4. Chapter 4

(I am ignoring the DVD ending. Nuh uh. Nope. Not acknowledging that extra scene. Can't.

With that said, enjoy! I haven't forgotten about this business, don't you worry. Thank you for reading!)

"Watch it."

"Piss off."

"Oh my god, Hal."

As muscular as he was, Hal was straining to lift their couch, backed against the wall, Tom on the other side, Alex acting as choreographer.

"Just let Hal go through the door first and take it really slow."

"May as well just throw the bloody thing down the stairs," Tom sighed, bending over to give lifting it a fresh attempt. "Alright. C'mon."

The gang was moving out of Honolulu Heights. They were moving to separate apartments, which was inevitable, but they had found a solution to the possibility of a sad goodbye – the apartments were one floor from each other. Hal and Alex, of course, were splitting one, and Tom was living on the floor under them. They were splitting the furniture between them. Alex looked like a deer, bounding gaily over boxes in the hallway, rushing back and forth from the moving van to their rooms, taping and gathering and sweeping while the boys moved the heavy items.

"Just a few more," she called when they had returned, 15 minutes later, from getting the couch into the truck. "We just need the upstairs dresser-" an noise of anguish from Hal – "and a few book stands and things and then we're good."

The space was lonely without the furniture and Alex turned slowly around, standing with her hands on her hips in the living room. The Hawaiian wall stood stark next to the bar, which was still stocked with dusty bottles that filtered light in at odd angles, that none of the inhabitants had touched.

She remembered how it was when Annie was still here, and how Annie hadn't liked her at first. The very first time they had been alone together was on the couch that Hal and Tom had just wrestled out the door. The sun was starting to set and she sighed, suddenly unwilling to leave. They had to, but there was a charm about the place. It had a lot of energy. The walls had seen a lot. Alex did a last-minute sweep of the house while Tom single-handedly carried a small table down the stairs and out the door, Hal maneuvering around him to follow up with the chairs.

Would the next people who moved in have any idea what happened here? Would it know that its inhabitants struggled and died on the floor of this very living room, in these very bedrooms?

Alex came down the stairs slowly, feeling the warm wood banister between her fingers, unevenly painted, frequently used.

Hal saw her downcast eyes and leaned, ever-suave, against the wall at the bottom of the stairs. He let her speak, and she took a moment to twine her arm around his back before elaborating.

"I'm gonna miss it here."


End file.
